On March 26, 2011, Brian Singer was invited to speak at the plenary session of the conference Peace Corps and Africa: Honoring 50 Years, held in Madison, Wisconsin. The event brought together returned Peace Corps Volunteers, scholars, and leaders reflecting on five decades of Peace Corps partnerships across the African continent.

Singer was invited to address the full conference audience—more than 200 participants—because of the work he and Tanzanian partners had built through Project Zawadi. In his remarks, titled Bringing the World Back Home, he reflected on how relationships formed during Peace Corps service can evolve into lifelong partnerships that continue long after a volunteer’s service ends.

While his thinking about development and partnership has continued to evolve since 2011, the speech captures an early reflection on the long-term journey that began during his Peace Corps service in Tanzania from 1993–1995. The speech below reflects on how service abroad can shape a lifetime of partnership and shared work.

 

“Late November 1993, I distinctly remember the night before I got on a plane and left my family for two years. I was literally awake all night – way too excited to sleep. I was fresh out of college and I had worked plenty through school at restaurants and on a farm, but I just couldn’t wait to actually ‘do something’ in this world. I mean really do something that would have a positive impact on the world. I knew I wouldn’t save the world, but it sure felt like I would have a very significant impact that would at a minimum, be a start at saving the world. It was a long, anxious night. Well the sun did finally rise and I hopped on a plane just wondering where I was really going and really anxious to get there and do something.

I soon found myself teaching mathematics in a remote Tanzanian high school. I dove head first into the culture and the language. I loved it. I really did. I also soon found myself providing some financial support to a family of 4 boys whose mother had disappeared and whose father had died from AIDS. It was obvious that without that little support that I provided they would not have attended school at all. As it turns out, you could say that that little bit of support was the start of what would later become Project Zawadi. I never had a plan to support those kids. And I definitely never planned on starting Project Zawadi. I really believe that paths opened up before me and I had the choice of either taking those paths or not. I ultimately decided that the cost of supporting those kids with their education really wasn’t much of a burden to me and so I went ahead. Besides, it really felt like a part of my effort to do something and yes, bring me further down that path to “saving the world.”

And then, suddenly, just like that, 2 years had passed. It was time to leave. I didn’t want to leave. I wasn’t ready to go. I did everything I could to stay. I even tried to find a job in Tanzania. I remember talking to the other volunteers about going back home. We chuckled at the thought of all those ‘materialistic’ Americans who had absolutely no idea how easy they had it. How none of them would ever understand half of what we’d seen. But we also wondered whether we too would soon forget about our time in the Peace Corps and just blend right in with American society. Would we forget Swahili? Would we lose the idealism that brought us there in the first place – that desire to do something for the world? Would we forget what life is really like in a Tanzanian village? Would we forget how truly amazing American supermarkets are? I vowed that I would not get swept away with life in America. I was determined to stay connected and some day return. In fact, I strongly resolved that without a doubt I would be back soon.

So I did what I had to do and hopped on the plane back to America. Yes, happy to see my family again, but definitely torn between two places. For five years I found myself thinking of Tanzania every day and I was desperate to return. I tried to stay in touch with Tanzania but communication was difficult. School and life kept me busy and got in the way. Finally, and rather suddenly, I found a free 3-week trip back to Tanzania as a volunteer for a US-based non-profit organization. I was elated to be back, to use Swahili and to see old friends. I found the family of kids that I had supported and enrolled two of them in a high-end private boarding school that I could not afford. Without enough money to pay for their education, I decided to send a simple letter to friends and family asking for donations. Before I knew it, I had too much money so we had to either give some money back or sponsor more kids. So we sponsored more.

And then a substantial donation was accompanied with the question: “Is this donation tax deductible?” This question pushed me to set about creating a formal non-profit organization. In a sense Project Zawadi was accidentally started. I didn’t know where it was going, but most of the time I just followed the path that opened up before me. Every now and again we have run into roadblocks and barriers, but we’ve always found a way to get around, or through them.

We got incorporated, formed a board of directors and obtained 501 c 3 tax exempt status from the IRS. These were the easy steps. We kept taking steps and we learned a lot along the way. We started by sponsoring 2 kids and raised less than $5,000 our first year. In our tenth year, we sponsored 385 kids and (would) raise just over $100,000.

A little background and some details regarding Project Zawadi. We identified 3 guiding principles that have remained mostly unchanged over the past 10 years:

1. Every child deserves an education (In other words, education should be a human right and not a privilege).
2. Children belong with their families and their communities.
3. Local communities know best what their vulnerable children need.

Because we believe every child deserves an education, we do not ask the village to select children based on academic potential, but rather on need. So while academic success rates are higher for the PZ-sponsored students, they are not necessarily astonishingly higher.

And because we believe that children belong with their families and in their communities, we do not run or support an orphanage. In fact, there is no orphanage in Nyamuswa and the surrounding villages.
Every orphaned child has an extended family or neighbor that they can stay with. This keeps them connected to their communities – to their oh-so-important social web of support and connections that
they will need as they become adults. It has the added benefit of greatly reducing our costs – allowing us to spread our resources over a larger number of children.

Because of our belief that the local people know best, we work closely with a local NGO, called Zinduka, in Nyamuswa Village, where I lived for 2 years. We rely heavily on them to design and implement the most effective and efficient use of our resources. Zinduka itself has become one of the things that makes me proudest. Zinduka started at about the same time as Project Zawadi. They had no money but high aspirations. When they first started, most people in the village did not trust that they were real and assumed that they were just looking for money for themselves. But through the years Zinduka has proven itself to be the real deal and they have successfully raised funds from numerous other outside sources. In fact, they have even been successful at raising substantial funds from within their village to build a large, new water tank. In my opinion, that’s real evidence of local ownership – the kind that development workers always talk about.

In consultation with our community partners, we identify the students most in need – those who would be unlikely to attend school because their family cannot afford the expenses of going to school. Each year, those selected PZ students receive 2 sets of school uniforms, 2 pairs of shoes, textbooks, and school supplies. The older students receive lanterns (this year solar powered lanterns) and when necessary we pay all applicable school fees. Most importantly we give them a promise: A promise to support them through the highest educational level they can attain. This promise opens their minds to possibilities that many probably never dreamed of previously.

Additionally, we have identified teachers at each school to be what we are calling “Guardian Teachers”. These teachers work together with two paid counselors to provide ongoing monitoring and guidance to
each sponsored child and provide reports to Zinduka and ultimately PZ.

Essentially, we make a long-term commitment to them with the main goal that each student may achieve self-reliance. BTW, the term self-reliance is used purposefully. Not just for what it means in the general
dictionary definition, but also it intentionally gives a nod to Julius Nyerere’s published work titled “Education for Self-Reliance.” In this work, the first President of Tanzania explained how education
should not always be just about passing exams and going on to higher levels of education. But also about helping people achieve self-reliance for themselves at whatever level of education they are able to achieve. That’s why, when the students complete their basic education, whether after primary school or secondary school, we offer them the opportunity to further their education through vocational or other specialized training so they can achieve self-reliance.

We also spearhead school construction projects. We provide the cement, wood, tin sheets and nails. The community provides the manual labor and locally-made mud bricks. So far, we’ve built 10 classrooms, 1 office, 2 teachers’ houses and a dormitory at 10 different schools. PROJECT ZAWADI prides itself in getting the most out of its funds and ensuring that more than 95% of funds go directly to program expenses in Tanzania.

This is all great and we are very proud of these accomplishments, and we have many stories that demonstrate the power and importance of what we’re doing. But this has come with difficulties and with lessons on how things can be done better. In fact, we are still learning from difficulties. And we continue to evaluate and adjust how we do things.

At first, we were putting students in high-end boarding schools but not only was that very expensive but we learned that when you separate students from their extended families, moving them from a very
difficult environment to one of relative wealth, they don’t want to go home again, even for vacation. This, and the relative expense of private schools, caused us to shift our focus to government schools. This also allowed us to drastically cut costs and quickly ramp up the number of students we sponsor, but the standard of education in rural Tanzanian schools, with their severely overcrowded classrooms and shortage of teachers, is often so low that a significant number of PZ students still can’t get a respectable education. We have not yet found a simple answer to this difficult national problem. For those students we do put them in vocational school, but the number of students in vocational school now equals the number of students in high school and college. So this year, to meet the demand for vocational school, we are helping Zinduka start its own vocational program.

So how do we raise funds?

Virtually all our donations come from individuals. We have a database of about 1000 names now and we send one letter at the end of each year asking for donations. We have several that donate in the $500 to
$2000 range and a few in the $5,000 range. And hundreds who give an average of around $50 to $200 a year. This database list started with just my personal friends and family and then we added our board
members’ friends and family. And we also have a pretty good website that attracts people every now and then.

As for the source of much of our non-financial support, we have several RPCVs contributing. We have at least 5 RPCV’s who have served or are currently serving on the board. We’ve also had 4 Tanzanians living

in America who have served or are currently serving on the board. Other support has come from Friends of Tanzania, an RPCV group. They have supported some of our projects with cash donations and by featuring PZ’s work in their newsletter.

Of course, I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that we are currently seeking additional support for the work that we do. Frankly, now that we have a good system in place, we could easily expand should we ever see a surge in support. So if anyone is interested, or has leads for us, please visit our website at ProjectZawadi.org or ‘like’ us on facebook.com/projectzawadi.

One more thing on fundraising: About 3 years after we started PZ, a couple of my Tanzanian friends  came to me and said “Brian, this is great. We love helping the kids. But why don’t you start a business so we can have jobs?” At first I hesitated, but now we have a 7-year old safari company called Access 2 Tanzania (Access2Tanzania.com/). Although this business is indeed for-profit, I think of it as a social enterprise. For example, through this business, I’ve been able to introduce a lot of our customers to Project Zawadi and we have garnered a significant amount of financial (and other) support from them. On top of that, Project Zawadi never has to pay for a phone call to Tanzania, office supplies or my flights to Tanzania. Even more, Access 2 Tanzania makes a substantial cash contribution each year to Project Zawadi. Through our support, staff both here in the US and there in Tanzania, contribute many many hours of in-kind support.

So that’s a bit about what we’re doing with Project Zawadi. It has been a lot of work and we’ve hit some bumps in the road along the way. We didn’t always know exactly how to do what we were doing, but we carefully and thoughtfully put one foot in front of the other, not really knowing what to expect.

In closing, I’d just like to leave a thought. Yesterday, as I heard these illuminating stories about the very first days of the Peace Corps, I realized that the Peace Corps founders were doing the same thing: carefully and thoughtfully putting one foot in front of the other, not really knowing what to expect. In fact, that’s what each and every Peace Corps Volunteer has done over the past 50 years. And although for us RPCV’s, our two years may be over, and there is no reason to stop now. We’ll just continue taking those steps carefully and thoughtfully. And when you add up 200,000 efforts, well, now we’re doing something.”

-Brian Singer
March 26, 2011

 

More than a decade later, the ideas shared in this message still guide Project Zawadi’s work. What started with one volunteer’s small step of support has grown through partnership, trust, and the leadership of Tanzanian communities. The story has never belonged to one person alone—it is shared by students, families, educators, and supporters working together so children and youth can access education and opportunity. In many ways, meaningful change begins just like this: with a single step forward.